In Summer 2012, I took an Ancestry.com DNA test to analyze where geographically my DNA comes from. I blogged about my results here. Here is a brief summary of my original DNA breakdown:

Eastern European 71% Central European 23% Persian/Turkish/Caucasus 6%

The first two categories made sense to me; my Dad's whole side of the family were Polish and my mom's paternal grandparents were Croatian. My mom's other grandmother was northern Italian, so I figured that would account for some Central European. The Persian part was a surprise, and the region of Italy was completely left out of my results, which was unexpected because two of my great-grandparents were Italian. My Italian great-grandfather was Sicilian, and I chalked up that 6% to Sicily's period of Arabic rule.

Ancestry.com recently reanalyzed their clients' DNA samples, based on a new, more extensive database of "control' samples that they have recently collected from around the world. I got my new results about a month ago:

Aha! My Italian component shows up this time; however, I am thoroughly confused by the sizable Great Britain signature that didn't show up at all last time. It's almost as if the Great Britain signature has replaced the 'Central European' chunk from my original results. I have no known ancestors in the family tree from Great Britain or really anywhere that close to Great Britain, so the only thing I can think of is that at least several of my Italian, Croatian, and/or Polish great-grandparents have 'British' blood in them from some migration or intermarriage a LONG time ago. It's just that 31% is such a largish chunk, it seems like the genetic influence would be have to be in a more recent generation...

My Great Britain DNA results. Source: Ancestry.com

Much to my sister's delight, it looks as if we do have some Persian still showing up in the DNA signature, which she was excited about last time. For those of you who have received Ancestry.com's updated DNA results, do you think they made more sense or less sense to you than the original ones? I still do expect that our results will continue to change over time as they do more research and collect a large sampling for their control groups.

Last year, my curiosity got the best of me and I took one of the DNA tests offered by Ancestry.com. My results, which I discuss here, were somewhat surprising at first, but after I did some research into the ethnic history of my great-grandfather's homeland, they didn't seem to be implausible.

I asked my husband to take the same test a couple of months ago, again just mostly for fun. I've been researching his family tree for about two years. Honestly, I wasn't expecting much diversity in his genetic make-up. The vast majority of his ancestors were from France and Germany, with a few branches from Holland, Switzerland, and Austria, ALL of which are located in Ancestry.com's "Central European" region. Here are his results:

Husband's DNA Results. (Source: Ancestry.com)

Hmmm....that's a pretty decent chunk of Scandinavian there. (By the way, "Scandinavian" in these test results indicates genetic markers characteristic to modern-day Norway, Sweden, and Denmark.) Wasn't expecting that, or the Finnish/Russian. None of my husband's immigrant ancestors claimed Norway, Sweden, Finland or Russia as their homelands. However, I realize that the test can pick up genetic markers that originate much further back than a European paper trail, so I'm keeping an open mind.

I've been reading a lot of genealogy blogs and message boards pertaining to Ancestry's DNA test and it appears as if my husband is not the only one with the "Scandinavian Surprise." In fact, it seems to be quite common for people with documented ancestors from the British Isles and many parts of Europe to discover these Scandinavian signatures in their DNA, even though they have no knowledge of ancestors from these northern regions.People have claimed that something must be amiss in Ancestry's database or methodology. Ancestry is very forthcoming about the fact that their knowledge of genetic markers and database of samples from throughout the world is continually growing, and that the breakdown of your DNA test may change in the future, depending on what they learn. After doing some research, though, I think that my husband's results are definitely possible when I consider the close geographic proximity between Germany and Scandinavia and the history of contact between their peoples. Add to that the randomness with which DNA is passed on through the generations and these results aren't so far-fetched. This blog post from The Genetic Genealogist does a nice job of explaining why your results may not turn up as you had originally thought they would.

For several centuries about a thousand years ago, pretty much all parts of coastal Northern Europe and the British Isles were subject to some sort of Viking influence, whether it be permanent settlements or battle/raiding events. Just within the past couple of years, Silasthorp, a moderately-sized Viking settlement, was unearthed in northern Germany near the border with Denmark. Experts think that this settlement lasted for 300 years.A Viking burial ground, known as Altes Lager Menzlin, has been found on modern-day Germany's northeastern coast. And there is evidence that Germany's entire northern coast was subject to frequent raids by the Vikings, even as far south as Hamburg, which was raided in the year 845.

Viking Burial Ground at Altes Lager Menzlin. (Source: Wikipedia)

Even after the demise of the Viking settlements, there was still contact between the people of Germany and Scandinavia, particularly through trade.In my research, I learned of the Hanseatic League, which was an organization of merchant guilds and trade towns that operated in Northern Europe between the 1200s and 1700s. The group was a large and, at times, powerful conglomerate that included cities located in modern day Germany, Poland, Sweden, Russia, Latvia, Estonia, Norway, Belarus, and Belgium, with member towns even as far west as the British Isles. In fact, there was so much contact between Germany and Sweden through Hanseatic League dealings that the German language left a pronounced influence on the development of the Swedish language.

So, this is second DNA test our family has taken and in both occurrences the unexpected results have driven me to learn a little more about the history of our ancestors' homelands. The knowledge I've gained makes the test worth it to me, even if it doesn't lead to finding new ancestors or distant cousins.

I turned on my phone this morning while making breakfast (don't judge me), opened my email and expected to see the normal accumulation of junk mail from the overnight hours. Among that junk, though, I see one that says "Your DNA results are ready." Yay! Several weeks ago, I purchased a DNA testing kit from Ancestry.com. I spit in a tube (again, no judging allowed) and sent it off to the lab. Here are the results:

Source: Ancestry.com

Ok, so I was not at all surprised at the big chunk of "Eastern European." Both of my dad's parents were children of Polish immigrants, and my mom's dad was the child of Croatian immigrants. Now, the "Central European" made a little bit of sense to me, because my great-grandmother was from Milan, Italy, which is in northern Italy not far from Switzerland. Plus, both Croatia and the area in Poland where my great-grandparents were born are pretty close to where the Central and Eastern regions meet, so I figure there may have been some genetic influence there. I was NOT expecting to see the Persian/Turkish/Caucasus region anywhere in my genetic makeup. Actually, my first reaction when I saw the pie chart was, "Oh great, they messed up my test and the results are inaccurate." Then, I started to get a little more analytical and did some research. I looked at the map and started to think about my great-grandpa Licciardi, who was born in Palermo, Sicily, which appears at first glance to be isolated from any of the genetic regions highlighted. I do a little Google-searching about Sicily and its history. The more that I read, the more I begin to realize that, genetically, Sicilians are some of the most diverse people in Europe. It's a large island, situated right in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, which, for thousands of years was the main conduit for travel, trade, and conquest for most of Europe, northern Africa, and western Asia. Even today, evidence of the island's unique history remains in some of the island's older architecture. This is a photo from a wall in the city of Palermo:

San Cataldo Church in Palermo (built 1154) shows both Norman and Arabic architectural influences.

Palermo was conquered by Arabs in the mid-800s AD and Sicily became an Arab emirate in 965 AD. A little over a hundred years later, the Normans moved in and took Sicily from the Arabs. After a short period of coexistance between the Christians and Muslims, fighting and an intolerance for Islam developed from the late 1100s to early 1200s and the Muslims were given the choice to leave or convert to Christianity. Many Muslims left Sicily at this time, but some remained, converted, and assimilated with the native Sicilian population. Following the Normans, Sicily was ruled by German, French, and Spanish nobilities before the unification of Italy in the 1860s.

So, it's possible that that Persian/Turkish marker came from my Sicilian great-grandfather, but I'll probably never know for sure. And my 23% of "Central European" also may partially come through my Sicilian roots as well, considering the influences of various western European kingdoms in Sicily after the Arab influence had mostly waned. This DNA test is different from others out there in that it traces both your matrilineal and patrilineal lines by looking at the makeup of all 23 chromosomes, looking at 700,000 locations in the DNA. Ancestry.com claims that results are at least 98% accurate. If one of my siblings were to have their DNA analyzed, the results would probably be similar, but not exactly the same, because a person does not inherit genes from her mother and father equally (50/50). In fact, we can have ANY combination of our parents' genes in our DNA (40/60, 15/85, 96/4...you get the idea), and THEY have inherited some unknown combination from their parents, and so on and so on as you go back through the generations. Mother Nature is a wacky gal.Ancestry.com claims that the results of my test may change slightly as they acquire new DNA data that they are continually collecting from people all over the world. That's fine; I didn't expect it to help me find specific names of my ancestors or anything detailed like that. I mostly did this for fun, but it has certainly changed my perception of what a European heritage can look like and it has driven me to learn more about my great-grandfather's homeland.